


I Found You (At the Overstock Outlet)

by eternity_in_my_pocket



Series: Winter Tropes 2018 [4]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Christmas Fluff, F/M, M/M, Meet-Cute, everyone loves a good yarn, finding love in all the right places in all the right outlet malls, how many easter eggs can u find, or ugly christmas sweater
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-07
Updated: 2018-12-07
Packaged: 2019-09-13 08:03:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,260
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16888725
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eternity_in_my_pocket/pseuds/eternity_in_my_pocket
Summary: Chills are in the air - obviously so, it's fuckingfreezingoutside - but so is a hint of winter love. When Bucky goes gift shopping for his new boyfriend and Nat tags along, will she find a little bit of love herself?





	I Found You (At the Overstock Outlet)

**Author's Note:**

> This is a part of my Winter-Trope-Bingo-Challenge on Tumblr. For the BINGO card you can follow the link to see the post [HERE](https://eternity-in-my-pocket.tumblr.com/post/180362943864/its-almost-that-time-of-year-my-favorite-time). Go there if you're interested in participating!
> 
> This fic checks my "free space" box and I used the line, **"Christmas hats are the bomb, okay?"**
> 
> I wanted to use this challenge to write pairings that I normally don’t write and try to branch out in the MCU. Let me know what you think! At this point, I know I'm not going to reach my deadline that I set on Tumblr, but they don't really get read on there that much. SO, regardless of that deadline, I'm going to keep posting them here until Christmas, January, or whenever I fill up the BINGO chart or get tired of writing winter fics. YAY. Woo! I should stop typing now.

“Barnes, it’s barely December first.” Natasha deadpanned. 

She was _not_ in the mood for this. It had been well below freezing for the past two weeks and, while it wasn’t as cold as the temps could get back home, she didn’t want to be out in it more than she had to. She was more than willing to stay in their apartment all day catching up on her studies and squeezing in some YouTube videos here and there, but once her roommate got it in his head he needed to do something, it was all over. It wasn’t that she was being dragged along, but Barnes _had_ used _those eyes_ and threatened to withhold the cocoa packets _and_ marshmallows _and_ the rum.

Damn him.

“Listen,” Bucky said, nonchalantly browsing the aisle, “I really like this guy and want to get him something cool. Starting now gives me more time.”

Natasha rolled her eyes, but internally smiled anyways. Yeah, she could tell how head-over-heels her friend was for this guy. For _Steve_ – Bucky always said it with such care.

“Alright, well I’m going to go look at the hats. I feel like my ears are going to get frostbite soon if the wind doesn’t let up. Text me if you can’t find me.”

“Ten-four!”

They were in the Overstock Outlet – their favorite place to go because of discounts and variety. She appreciated the way everything was organized both in chunks by item type (clothing, accessories, frames, knicknacks) _and_ they always had a good rotation of stuff throughout the year. She made her way over to the seasonal goods section; this years variety being _tons_ of “ugly sweaters”, as well as some that made their way to hat form.

She couldn’t help but pick up a red and white striped hat, long and triangular, like something elves might wear. She stuffed it on her head and moved to look in the mirror: It looked absolutely goofy. She took it off her head and a voice piped up, almost startling her.

“That one looked awesome.”

Trying not to glare, she turned to see where the voice was coming from. A few yards away with his hand stilled on the rack of ugly sweaters stood a young man about her height with cropped hair, an easy smile, and the most ridiculous scarf she’d ever seen. 

“Should I trust your judgment?” She nodded to the scarf.

He looked down and flushed, “Harsh. Alright, maybe that one isn’t the best one out of them.” He walked over beside her and sifted through the rack, pulling one off it’s pin – a green number, with triangle points, bells, baubles and even a star on top – and handed it to her. “The winner!”

She couldn’t help but bite her lip at his shit-eating grin, but pushed the Christmas Tree-Shaped hat out of the way. “Your taste is impeccable. Not quite my style though.”

“Oh? What’s your style then? Lemme guess. You don’t like exciting. Don’t like new. You want to blend in. Be warm but not be seen?” When she shrugged he scoffed, “How boring.”

She rolled her eyes and kept looking through the rack. She’ll admit she _did_ like the ones that looked like elf hats – if she got one tight enough she could probably store something in the extra space, maybe sew a pocket in it? - but she wasn’t going to tell this guy that. 

“It’s not boring, it’s functional. Multi-seasonal even.”

“Fun can be functional, too.” He quipped, pulling the colorful scarf over his face to act as a mask. She got a good look at it: knitted, albeit a little harshly – maybe by a beginner? - in just about every color imaginable – maybe scraps? Attached here and there, all over, were small pom-poms and buttons. The buttons weren’t average, circular buttons though – they were shaped: arrows, owls, was that a cat one? “By the way, my brother made this. He wanted a new hobby and made the most outrageous thing he could think of and bet me I wouldn’t wear it all winter.”

“Obviously he was wrong.”

“Obviously,” he shrugged, “I’ve worn it for five winters.”

She pulled out another hat – this one was purple and looked like a monster with large white eyes, horns, stripes, colorful straps by the ear flaps, and even teeth that hung down below the brim by the forehead.

“Why don’t you get him to make you a sweater then? Instead of buying one of these.”

He stopped his search of the sweaters and looked at her incredulously, “Are you kidding me? He’d probably knit the image of a dick into it and I _wouldn’t_ be able to win that bet.”

Natasha bit back a laugh. She and her critic searched the racks in silence. She’d gone through almost all the hats and was starting to get miffed and ready to find Bucky when she felt the guy tap her on the shoulder.

“I think I’ve got the winner.” He held the hat out to her – a black slouchy beanie, solid except for the spider outlined to contrast in white with a distinctive red mark on it’s back. “I think it was left over from the Halloween stock.”

She raised her eyebrow, “A black widow?”

He shrugged, “You look like the kind of gal that would kill a guy for looking at her the wrong way. It fits.”

Her mouth tilted – she wasn’t going to grin, dammit, “You’re not wrong.”

“Does this black widow have a name?” he pried, his own face oozing charm.

“Natasha.”

“Clint. I’m giving up the sweater search, wanna help me look for a hat?”

“Does it have to be Christmassy?”

“Christmas hats are the bomb, okay?”

xxx 

Natasha waited in line to check out, her black hat in hand. She had no idea where the hell Bucky had wandered off to – one second she was telling him about the guy that she’d been talking to in the Christmas aisle, the next thing she knew he was excitedly stumbling over an excuse saying something about going to the restroom and was walking away. The line wasn’t long, so it wasn’t long until she was at the front and Bucky was behind her ready to check out with three people between them. Of course she had to wait on him.

“Why did you leave? We could have checked out together and been out of here.” Nat grumbled, punching Bucky in the arm.

He only grinned. “I had to check out sweater guy for myself.”

“Ugh. You have a man, Barnes.”

“Oh, are you calling dibs? Nat is finally interested in someone, is that what I’m hearing?” He taunted. 

Nat rolled her eyes and zipped her coat up, preparing herself to go back out into the snow. “You heard nothing.”

“So you’re telling me you aren’t interested?”

“That’s exactly what I’m saying.”

“Well I got his number for you,” Bucky said, holding up his phone and waving it in front of her face, “I guess I’ll just hold onto it myself.”

Natasha’s face went stale and she made a lunge for the phone, “Over my dead body.”

Bucky easily let go of the phone and let his friend have it and watched in amusement as she typed the guy’s number in her phone while trying to hide the grin on her own face.

She handed Bucky’s phone back to him and slipped her own in her pocket, pointing a finger in his face, “Shut up.”

Bucky grinned as he followed her out the door, “I didn’t say a word.”


End file.
